Philip Kerr - Research

It was Michael Twentyman and he was accompanied by two permatan blondes wearing tiny skirts and heels as sharp as a leather worker’s awl. They had all just started cigarettes.

‘How the hell are you? Ladies, this is the man I was telling you about. This is Lev Kaganovich. My neighbour from across the hall. Lev? I’d like you to meet a couple of friends of mine. Anastasia and Katya. Say hello to my little friends, Lev. Ladies, Lev is from Smolensk.’

I bowed my head politely. ‘ Dobry vecher .’ That and ‘ Dobry den ’ were two of only three things I knew how to say in Russian. I actually said it twice; perhaps I figured it would make me sound twice as Russian as saying it only once.

One of the women said something back in Russian which of course I didn’t understand.

‘Do you speak any Russian, Michael?’ I asked him.

‘Not a damn word,’ he said.

‘Then ladies, for Michael’s sake, let us speak only in English. Or perhaps French. To do otherwise would be rude.’

‘I don’t speak any French either,’ said Twentyman. ‘No one speaks French in Monaco. And frankly these days, Lev, Russian will get you further than English. That and Arabic, of course. Hey, look, are you with someone? Why don’t we all hook up? We’re having dinner right now in the hotel’s Michelin-starred restaurant and we just came out for a smoke.’

‘Yes,’ said Anastasia. ‘That would be nice.’

‘That’s the great thing about France. No one minds if you smoke outside a restaurant.’

‘I’d really love to, Michael.’ I eyed Katya meaningfully as if nothing would have given me more pleasure than a couple of hours spent with her. ‘But I have an important client waiting on the terrace restaurant downstairs and I’m on the verge of closing a very lucrative deal. So you’ll really have to excuse me.’

I knew that wouldn’t be enough for Twentyman so I took him by the elbow and led him out of the back of the garden to the door of the Michelin-starred restaurant.

‘Give me your card,’ I said. ‘Perhaps, if I can finish my business in time I can join you somewhere afterward. I really like your two friends.’

‘Stasia is my girlfriend,’ explained Twentyman as he opened his wallet and thumbed out a business card that was as thick as an invitation to a royal garden party. ‘But Katya is a great girl. Very warm. You and she would really hit it off.’

‘I think so, too.’

Twentyman handed me his card. ‘Do you have a card?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘In my line of work, it’s best to keep one’s telephone numbers secret. But I will call you later, yes?’

‘Great. Hey, maybe we can go to Studio 47 in Nice.’

‘Sounds like a plan.’

‘By the way, I meant to ask you earlier. Where’s Colette? I haven’t seen her in a while.’

‘She’s with her family, in Marseille.’ I winced. ‘She and I are no longer an item, as you Americans say. To be frank with you, it’s been a little difficult with her.’

‘Sure, I know what that’s like.’

‘See you later, I hope.’

I went back down to the table where I’d left John. He had one of his little Smythson notebooks open on the table in front of him and he was writing something in a small, neat hand.

‘You’re writing?’

‘Keeping notes,’ he said. ‘For research purposes. You never know, some of these experiences might turn out to be useful. For a novel. Or perhaps my prison autobiography.’

‘Or The Geneva Convention , perhaps. I’m sure you can work some of your recent experiences into a plot like that.’

John shook his head. ‘I’m afraid The Geneva Convention is no more,’ he said. ‘It turns out that Robert Harris wrote a thriller called The Fear Index about a Geneva-based hedge fund.’

‘But the plot you outlined to me is very different from his,’ I said. ‘Besides, you’ve always said that you should never be deterred by someone writing a book which is in the same ball-park. That sometimes the second book about something succeeds where the first one fails.’

‘But his one didn’t fail. That’s rather the point, old sport. Anyway, what the fuck took you?’ John drained his glass and poured another. ‘I thought you’d run out on me. The food here’s not that bad.’

‘You know you’re going to have to start trusting me, John.’

He nodded. ‘Fair enough. I’m sorry.’

‘I ran into Michael Twentyman. It seems he’s having dinner with a couple of friends in the other restaurant.’

‘What did you tell him? Suppose he recognizes me?’

‘He doesn’t know you.’

‘No, but my picture has been on the front of Nice-Matin .’

I smiled, wryly. ‘That picture doesn’t do you justice.’

‘I’m glad you think this is funny.’

‘I also had Chief Inspector Amalric on the phone,’ I said. ‘It seems that he wants to question me again.’

‘Jesus. About what?’

‘I rather imagine he thinks I can tell him where you are hiding.’

John bit his lip and looked worried. He turned around in his chair as if expecting to see the Chèvre d’Or terrace surrounded by French gendarmes. ‘Maybe they’re undercover cops,’ he said. ‘These other diners.’

Several of the other tables were occupied by Chinese — imperceptibly different from the Japanese who’d once flocked to Europe. I shook my head.

‘You don’t suppose he’s on to me? Your chief inspector.’

‘No. But I’m not so sure that he wouldn’t like to make me a suspect.’

‘You? What the fuck for? You haven’t killed anyone. At least no one I know about.’

‘I had the sneaking suspicion he might have spotted me in your building. When I was in there fetching that iPad.’

‘Christ, Don.’

John looked around again.

I shrugged. ‘Look, I’m probably imagining it. He didn’t get a good look at me. I’m certain of it.’

‘I hope so.’

‘He’s under a lot of pressure to get a result. From the Police Commissioner. And the Minister of Interior. He probably called me because he can’t think of anything else to do. That’s what cops are like when they’re not getting anywhere. They do everything they did before, again, in case they missed something. At least that’s what the clever ones do, and like I said before, Amalric is nothing if not clever.’

‘You’re not just saying that, are you? To make me feel better. Because as it is I’m not going to sleep a fucking wink tonight. My heart feels like a bloody canary.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘It was just a coincidence that he should have called me on the very night we went back to Monaco. Look, if they were really on to us, they’d have arrested us by now, don’t you think? I mean what’s to be gained by not picking us up now? He was on a fucking fishing trip, I’m sure of it. Because of the pressure from the top.’

I was trying to persuade myself of this as much as I was trying to reassure John that everything was all right. I was half inclined to climb in the Bentley and leave Èze as quickly as possible. Suddenly it seemed dangerously near Monaco. But I was dog-tired. Half a bottle of decent rosé will do that to you after a long drive. All I wanted now was to go to bed in a nice air-conditioned bedroom.

But I still had one thing to do.

‘My heart bleeds for him,’ said John.

I laughed. ‘Typical bloody Frenchman though. Always thinking about their cocks. He more or less asked me if I had a mistress. And when I said I didn’t, he suggested I should get one. He sounds like he’s a shagger. A real DSK.’

John frowned. ‘A DSK? What’s that?’

‘Dominique Strauss-Kahn. You know? He was MD of the IMF before he got caught with his trousers down and the French press turned him into Monsieur Cinq-à-Sept .’